


Home

by Sedecrem



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Catelyns thoughs, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Other, Revenge, and Arya's?, im really bad at tags, its complicated just read it, killing of Walder Frey, red wedding ish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-24
Updated: 2020-08-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 19:29:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26084230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sedecrem/pseuds/Sedecrem
Summary: So I just thought about this while watching season 3 of Game of Thrones again. I am currently reading the books again (it always surprises me how much new things a come across). Even though this is more based on the show there is some of the books in it too.It might not make any sense but I just felt like writing this, sooo here it goes....
Relationships: Arya Stark & Catelyn Tully Stark
Kudos: 10





	Home

''Arya! Arya! come back to me right this instance young lady!''

Lady Catelyn Tully Stark was known to be an elegant woman. Even though the lady had long passed her maiden age she still had long soft auburn hair and blue eyes that made men week in their knees. Everything the lady did, she did with grace and beauty. Her eldest daughter, Sansa, was set to inherit her traits, at age 9 she was already her spitting image, but Lady Catelyn affirmed, to everyone who would comment on it, that her daughter would become even more beautiful than she ever was. Lady Catelyn however, had stopped looking elegant on only a few occasional matters, it was the rare moments that concerned her youngest daughter, Arya. A wild unkept thing, with the true Northern blood rushing through her veins. Everyone knew that the youngest of the Stark daughters could not be tamed. The past had shown what happened to the last she-wolf. But nevertheless, Lady Catelyn was still sure she could make a lady out of her wild wolf (always deeming that she might be a wolf yet still half a Tully). Arya was her daughter after all, and she knew there had to be some Tully blood in that body of hers.

It was on moments like this, that there could be seen some cracks in the usually compelled manner of the lady Stark. Of everyone the lady knew, Arya was the only one who could crack some of her usually calm posture. ''It's the wolf blood'', Ned Stark would tell his wife when she began complaining,'' It runs deep inside of her, deeper than even Brandon or Lya ever had.'' he would say this only once in a while, it would be said with a sad kind of smile. And Catelyn knew that the fate of Ned's death siblings still haunted him till this very day. It was why she swore to herself to make an impelling lady out of Arya so that no one would compare her to her dead uncle, or worse, her dead aunt.

Besides, Arya might have the Stark look, but even she couldn't deny that some of her hot-headed tempers did not come only from her father's side. No, better yet, when Lady Catelyn had been a girl, before the death of her lady mother, she was known to be quite wild too. Always swimming and playing around, eventually, she had grown out of it, she grew up, she had to. And now, now it was time for Arya to get the right guidance to do so too.

''Arya!'' Lady Catelyn shouted again. The girl in question had started to run away, desperately trying to get away from the task that was long before finished for the upcoming day. There were still dresses to fit, sizes to measures and colours to choose. Lord Stark was planning on housing the Karstarks and Umbers in two weeks from now, and Arya had yet to get a new dress.

Her youngest daughter huffed and screamed, ''It's not fair. I don't want to wear a stupid dress! Robb promised I could go riding anyways!'' She yelled at the lump of her throat.

Gods, the girl could infuriate the worst of her. Lady Catelyn managed to look in time to the ground to see the steps in front of her, barely managing to escape an embarrassing fall. She tried, she really tried to stay calm, but there was so much you can do with a daughter as wild as Arya, so she began to shout again, chin held high, not caring that people could see. 

''Arya of House Stark! Listen to me young lady, I'm not done with you yet!'' She screamed again, and questioned herself briefly of her own sanity, even though knowing it would fall on deaf ears.

''NO!'' her daughter argued back, hands on her ears ignoring her lady mother as she ran. Lady Catelyn, who had now started to lift a small part of her skirt in order to move faster, sighted angrily. She usually sends someone else to chase after Arya, but today was proven to be a delicate matter, and so she was the one now chasing her own daughter. Arya, who was quick, had made the mistake to look back to see an angry looking lady Catelyn running after her. It was at that moment that a shriek could be heard. The wild wolf girl had fallen down over something she would refer to in the future, to her brothers and sister as _'' just a stupid pebble''_ , her siblings were smart enough to never argue with her on that matter. But the fact remained that it was indeed a pebble, a small pebble. However, that pebble in question had caused her daughter’s head to fall against a big sharply stone. The shriek that soon followed after the fall, made everyone hold their breaths. The sound, however, didn't come from the little lady now bleeding on the ground, no, it was her lady mother, the elegant Lady Catelyn Stark that had screamed in agony watching her child in horror make that horrible fall. Lady Catelyn ran as hard as she could to get to her daughter as quickly as possible.

Everybody in Winterfell knew the two ladies had, something called, a complicated relationship but it was also known that Lady Catelyn was extremely protective of her children, all five of them. So when she had seen her youngest daughter fall down in front of her eyes, it was like the world falling down. It was a nasty fall when Arya’s head had landed on the sharp edge of the rock.

Of all her years as a mother, Catelyn had seen her children fall and get up again, except for Sansa. Her beautiful daughter had never been interested in any kind of dangerous activity. But with the boys, as they grew older and wilder, it was known that playing around (usually) ended with some scrapes and bruises. She had never witnessed something so horrible and painful as the fall of Arya though, not even with the elder boys.

She quickly rushed to her daughter's side and began to soothe her with words. ''Oh Arya, my little wolf pup, are you alright?'' She had brushed some strains of hair out of her daughter's face but the face that stared back at her surprised her, to say the least. Grey stormy eyes locked onto her Tully blue. And she was reminded yet again, how different the two of them really were.

Rob had once fallen down too. It had happened during one of his so-called ''adventures'' in Winter town with the Kraken boy, Catelyn didn't like the ward, he had a bad influence on her firstborn. He was rushed back to measter Luwin and had managed to keep in his tears until he saw his Lady Mother. When he had caught sight of his mother, the dam broke. Catelyn still remembered how much he had cried and how she had shooed him through the whole night. Something similar had happened to Rickon not even a few days ago, but all and all, it was nothing compared to the fall Arya just experienced. So it was only normal that Lady Catelyn expected to see her wildest pup in tears and screaming too.

Arya, however, looked only annoyed as if she had lost some kind of bed she had made with one of her brothers. Even though Catelyn knew she must be in pain, visible as the deep red full of blood latched onto her face, Arya didn't show.

''You're faster than you look'', was the only thing her daughter managed to say.

Catelyn was so surprised by her response that she didn't know what to do. That only lasted for a few seconds though, before throwing her arms around her wild pup. At that moment Catelyn Stark decided her daughter was a truly a strange yet strong person.

Now it was Arya's time to be surprised by the sudden change of her mother. But soon, she also threw her small arms around her mother's neck.

It was nice she admitted to herself later that night when she was put to bed, to have a mother who cared. Right before getting a night-time story and kisses all over her face, she decided she was grateful to have a mother who cared for her and loved her, even if she didn't always make to show it. And even though they didn't look anything alike.

That day Lady Catelyn had promised Arya she wouldn't need to come to the dress fitting, that she could just wear one of Sansa's old ones. She had made sure that Old Nan could stay with her for stories and she made sure the kitchen made her daughters favourite lemon cakes and had them brought to their room right after measter Luwin had tended to her wounds. Even Jon got to visit her in her chamber and Sansa wasn’t as annoying as she had been earlier that day.

Later that evening, when the lady Catelyn told her husband what had happened that day. About the fact that her daughter didn't even shed one tear and stayed strong through everything, he only smiled that sad smile of his. It was as if the story didn't seem to surprise him one bit, '''So does this mean you will stop making a lady out of her my sweet wife?'' he asked her lovingly. Catelyn huffed and Ned had to hold back a chuckle when he saw his lady wife bite her lower lip, something one of their children had inherited from his wife. It was something she didn't usually do, it was a bad habit after all.

''A lady?'', his wife looked at him as if he had asked the strangest question. It was only when he saw her smiling face that he knew that it was in good humour. ‘’Why, I don't think I have to make a lady out of her, after all, she is a fighter, my little Northern warrior.''

Ned Stark let out one of his rare laugh, a booming sound that, even the servants could hear from down the kitchen. He kissed his lady wife and added. '''That she is my lady, that she is, our Northern little knight, don't you agree?'' Catelyn smiled and leaned her head onto her husband shoulders, ''I've always wanted a knight of my one.'' The lady japed and it was only when she had fallen asleep that Ned realised her words, 'Wait what?' ‘’a knight of her own? What did she mean by that? ''Cat? Cat, what do you mean a knight of your own?''

Of course, the Lady Catelyn had by long fallen into a peaceful dream and Ned knew that waking up his beloved wife after almost never falling so peacefully asleep would mean his end, it was another trait she and their youngest daughter shared with each other, so he just smiled and eventually fell asleep.

Afterwards, the lady Catelyn of house Stark felt compelled with her task of being a mother of a she-wolf. There were, of course, some occasions in the streak of time that made her patient get tested by the little wildling, but for now, she knew it was best to let her daughter be.

So years later, when Lady Catelyn heard the last words that would ever be spoken to her. _''....I'll find another.''_ And right before she saw her firstborn son die in front of her eyes, stabbed multiple times in a row by the traitor of a leech lord, _''the Lannisters send their regards''_.

She was left with the thoughts of her children, scattered around and lost in the world. Her oldest daughter somewhere stuck in a loveless marriage with a Lannister monster as a husband, and her youngest sons, who were only boys, innocent, yet killed the same, the thought of her husband, the love of her life, murdered for his loyalty. Strangely it was only the thoughts of her youngest daughter, and only her youngest daughter, that had kept her from giving up at that moment. It was the strength she had always seen in her wild wolf of a girl that continued her to fight till the very end. The thoughts of Arya were bittersweet _. Arya, my wild little Arya, I’ve not given her enough love_ , she felt a tinge of guilt that soon was replaced by a strange kind of peace. It spread out onto her body and she knew that somehow and someway Arya had managed to survive, that she had proven them all wrong and that she would surprise everyone. Just like Arya had surprised her that time when she had shed no tears when she made that nasty fall.   
And the thoughts that someday her wild daughter would come back, would come back home, and avenge their family was going through her mind before cutting the throat of the woman. _Arya_ she thought, let them all laugh and mock her now because sooner or later Arya would surprise them all, _her daughter_ would avenge her death and the death of her family. And for now, that was enough for the lady Catelyn of house Tully and Stark to drop the dagger in her hand and embrace her dead. The ending of a great woman, of a mother, a wife, a niece, she was Lady Catelyn of House Tully, but people would forever know her as the mother of the she-wolf, the woman who had given birth to one of the greatest queens Westeros had ever known. She was Lady Catelyn Tully in her youngest years and she died proudly, honourable and strong as Lady Catelyn of House Stark, the mother of the wolf pack.

**_Arya knew something was wrong the moment she arrived at the Twins, yet, she had been so close to her family that she didn't seem to care anymore. She knew the hound had saved her life by knocking her out, and later she had wished she had been out a little bit longer, for the sight that she saw while opening her eyes, would forever be marked on her mind. Her brother's Dire wolf was sewed onto his lifeless body while it was being paraded around. 'King in the North! king in the North'' they all mocked and shouted. It was at this moment and the moment when she would later see the body of her dead lady mother in the river through her wolfs eyes, that she decided she would avenge her family, she would avenge her mother_ **

**_So when that time came and when she stood in front of Lord Walder Frey. She felt calm, she felt strong. And while she slit his throat, she couldn’t help but feel as if a piece of life was given back to her. And she wondered if it was the stranger who gave her this gift. When she inhaled deeply all she smelled was the smell of her mother’s soap, the pine needles and freshly baked bread of Winterfell. And all she could hear was the rustling of the weir wood leaves in her ears. No, not the stranger, her father’s gods, the old gods._ **

**_Home, she thought suddenly, she had to go home._ **


End file.
